Indy Startup Weekend Births Five New Businesses
Dec., 7, 2008 – While most of the Indy business community was shoveling snow or shopping at the mall this weekend, a group of approximately 40 entrepreneurs gave birth to five new businesses. With skill sets ranging from technology and finance to marketing and project management, these entrepreneurs brainstormed, developed, designed, and refined their business concepts.
The businesses resulting from the Indy Startup Weekend included:
ShoutNow www.shoutnow.com - A rapid voice messaging service which allows users to instantly share voicemails with an unlimited network of contacts by placing just one phone call.
Pocket Story Book – www.pocketstorybook.com – A service to create custom children’s books which can be shared via download to web or iphone, or by printing through a 3rd party book publisher
Pocket Tales – www.pockettales.com Interactive children’s eBooks for the iPhone and the iPod touch. Sold through Apple’s AppStore, pockettales’ applications convert ordinary mobile devices into fun, educational tools.
More Than A Meal – www.morethanameal.com Bad things can happen to good people. When the unexpected happens, your friends need More Than A Meal.
ScatterGear – www.ScatterGear.com is a market-specific online storefront which offers goods and services to and for military personnel and their families.
“The companies and projects that come out of the weekends are fantastic” said Clayton Stobbs, interim CEO of Startup Weekend. “But the main goal of Startup Weekend is to build community and give participants entrepreneurial experience they can apply in these and future ventures.”
“Each weekend has its own distinctive feel because of group size, participants’ skill sets, and local and geographical influences” said Startup Junkie and weekend facilitator Nick Seguin. “But in each case, and Indy was no different, there is a common thread of innovation and community.”
About Indy Startup Weekend: Startup Weekend (www.startupweekend.com ) recruits a highly motivated group of developers, business managers, startup enthusiasts, marketing gurus, graphic artists and more to a 54-hour event that builds communities, companies and projects. Founded in 2007 by Andrew Hyde, the weekend focuses on learning by creating. The program has already met with success in Boulder, Toronto, New York, Hamburg, Houston, West Lafayette, Boston, DC and many more.
The Indianapolis event took place at the Purdue School of Engineering and Technology at the downtown IUPUI campus. The event was made possible with support from the following local sponsors: BlueLock, Compendium Blogware, Rainmakers, Hanapin Marketing, Smaller Indiana, Techpoint, OneDegreeConnect.com, and national sponsor Media Temple.
For more information on the progress of these new companies or the next Startup Weekend visit indianapolis.startupweekend.com or contact local organizer Lou Begnel at lbegnel@gmail.com .
About Shout Now: ShoutNow has launched a rapid voice messaging service which allows users to instantly share voicemails with an unlimited network of contacts by placing just one phone call. ShoutNow is ideal for community based organizations that have a diverse group of members and a need to deliver critical messages in a cost effective manner. Molly Butters – mbutters@shoutnow.net www.shoutnow.net 317.215.5012.
About Pocket Story Pocket StoryBook is a web-based platform which allows users create custom children’s books which can be shared via download to web or iphone, or by printing through a 3rd party book publisher. The success of the product is built into the viral nature of the user generated content.
Andrew Gouty agouty@riaktstudios.com (317) 418-2757 – www.pocketstorybook.com
About PocketTales PocketTales is a publisher of interactive children’s eBooks for the iPhone and the iPod touch. Sold through Apple’s AppStore, pockettales’ applications convert ordinary mobile devices into fun, educational tools.
PocketTales’ unique design provides access to multiple stories through just one download, providing hours of education and fun. Leveraging the full capabilities of the digital medium, PocketTales integrates voice recording making it possible for children to listen to their parents reading their favorite story, anytime and anywhere.
Media Contact: R. Brennan Knotts -Email: rbrennanknotts@gmail.com-Phone: (513) 225-2338-www.pockettales.com
About More Than A Meal When friends experience the unexpected, they often require help to get by. Whether it’s a death in the family, a newborn baby, an extended hospitalization, or just general overload, people need the help of their friends when their lives are disrupted. More Than A Meal helps you coordinate and participate in group efforts to provide the items and services that help your friends make it through challenging times.
Media Contact: Steve Chau – Email: steven.chau@mac.com – Phone: (816) 256.4919- www.morethanameal.com
Blog of the Month
Indianapolis Startup Weekend – A Blast
Posted by Nwokedi C. Idika on December 9, 2008 at 8:30pm
http://www.smallerindiana.com/profile/NwokediCIdika
I can’t lie, I didn’t know what to *really* expect from startup weekend before I attended. Being one that enjoys uncertainty to a degree larger than the average person, such uncertainty did not bother me, it actually made me more curious. I thoroughly enjoyed my time at the weekend. Below, I have outlined some observations I made during and after the weekend. I have a ton of lessons that I’ll probably release in a series of posts.
There will be a lot of ideas pitched during the pitching session . You WILL NOT remember all of them. If any idea jumps out at you, roll with it. If not, wait a little bit, and teams will begin to organically form. Choose the team based on the activity you want to be engaged in. If I’m interested in doing an iPhone application, I’ll choose a team based on the criterion.
Startup Weekend is a great way for sponsors (or companies in general) to find potential hires . If you want to see how people react under pressure, who really knows their elbow from their foot, who really meshes with people, who consistently comes up with sound ideas, who is unreliably — these things all get fleshed out in a relatively short weekend. So to you all you companies out there, stop doing those phony baloney interviews to hire people and use a model consistent with startup weekend. But don’t take my word for it, go to a startup weekend and see it for yourself.
Startup Weekend brings together a lot of highly skilled people . I can only speak based on my team’s experience, but it appeared to me that pretty much everyone had something valuable to contribute. There were no real bumbling “idiots.” I think this speaks to the type of people that something like a Startup Weekend attracts. Again, recruiters should really think about having their companies sponsor a startup weekend–but what do I know?
It’s absolutely impossible to attend a Startup Weekend and NOT learn anything new . If you’re socializing and working on interesting things, learning something new is rule and not the exception. If learning new/cool/useful things don’t turn you on, then it’ll probably be best you skip startup weekend.
Expect to average about 4-5 hours of sleep during the weekend MAX . You won’t really notice it though 
). (especially if you’re in a fun group!) You get to do something that a lot people will be unable to say they have ever experienced. How cool is that?
People from Kansas City have good ideas ) …residents of KC ended up being the idea leaders for at least 2 of the 5 groups at Indy’s startup weekend.
